The most natural way to design robots is to include wheels, legs, or tracks for movement, but there are other alternatives. In the past we have seen a giant sphere, and designs that directly imitate creatures like octopuses and birds. Today we come across the jumping mollusk robot from Harvard and the University of California San Diego, with soft and rigid sections that allow it to jump without destroying itself in the process.
Surviving extreme environments
Some robots must be designed to withstand extreme environments. Chemical spills, radiation, collapses, floods, fires, cold... the list goes on. However, there is one force that deserves our respect at every moment: gravity. Something as simple as tripping and falling incorrectly could leave a robot out of combat, either through internal damage or being unable to restore its position. This forces engineers to consider all possibilities before "feeling comfortable" with a specific design, and even then, something unexpected can always arise. How could the robot recover from a fall? How would it avoid obstacles that prevent it from rolling or walking?
One answer to those questions is jumping, but this in turn poses another challenge: the robot's own endurance. If it is not robust and/or flexible enough, after the jump we will likely be picking up its pieces. This is where the work of several experts at Harvard and the University of California San Diego comes in. The robot's structure was 3D printed, and most impressively, it transitions from a rigid core inside to a soft exterior. The engineers faced another dilemma: a more solid structure would have allowed higher jumps, but as we can see in the video, the tests did not yield good results. How does the robot manage to jump without damaging itself? Basically, by filling its soft chamber with butane gas, oxygen, and a spark. Boom.
Impressive test results
With its current configuration, the robot managed to lift itself a not-insignificant 75 centimeters into the air, while its lateral displacement was fifteen centimeters. In total, the robot jumped more than a hundred times and withstood falls of 1.2 meters on 35 occasions. Although the robot does not appear to have immediate applications, what was learned here will surely help in the development of future robots with greater locomotion capabilities.
